Hooke's Law

Restoring force of a spring proportional to its extension — the seed of every harmonic oscillator in physics.

Core Principles & Analysis

• Hooke published it in 1676 as the anagram "ceiiinosssttuv", revealed two years later as ut tensio, sic vis.
• It holds only below the elastic limit, beyond which materials deform permanently.
• Its harmonic oscillator generalizes everywhere: molecular vibrations, phonons, and AC circuits all obey its mathematics.

Specifications & Metrics

• SYMBOL: F = −k·x